I Heart Old: Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History

I've been meaning to get through the oodles of pictures from my rainy afternoon spent here during our trip to DC for quite awhile now, and hooray! I finally did.

I started off my tour in the Hall of Mammals. The taxidermy was really amazing, especially the action scenes.

But of course I appreciated the cute fuzzy creatures sitting still as well.

I went through the Hall of Human Origins next and then came across this:

I won't even pretend to understand what hyperbolic space means exactly, but the premise of this exhibit is that coral reefs and accompanying sea creatures as represented by bunches and bunches of crocheted odds and ends, illustrate a complex geometric concept.

There are crocheted reefs in a handful of cities around the world. Made by volunteers, they are also meant to draw attention to ecological issues. The effort is quite impressive and the resulting myriad of colors and textures is really beautiful.

Next was lunch and then a really fascinating exhibit on recent studies of human remains from the 17th century Chesapeake. (Well fascinating to me anywho).

After ingesting loads of information, my little brain needed a rest which came in the form of the eye candy that was the Hall of Geology, Gems, and Minerals.

Unfortunately I didn't get a good shot of the Hope Diamond which is on display there, but emeralds and sapphires such as these aren't too bad to look at I suppose.

But, as a girl who when she was little could be entertained for hours by picking through the rocks that made up the driveway looking for pretty ones, I think I almost liked the specimens in their raw forms better.

Amazing all these shapes, textures, colors, etc. can occur naturally. As rocks!

After I finished up at the Natural History Museum, I did dash into the Museum of American History long enough to peak at Julia Child's kitchen. Cozy and filled with gadgets, but mostly of the more low-tech variety.